Monday, October 22, 2007

Books and Beverages Book Review: "Sphere of Influence" by Kyle Mills

Get your Tassimo brewer ready and brew yourself up a nice Gevalia Cappuchino, because this book is going to keep you up all night, so might as well brew up the extra caffeine so your body can keep up.

After interviewing Kyle Mills I got a bit of an insight as to what makes FBI Agent, Mark Beamon tick. This book proves my thoughts. Mark Beamon is an unconventional FBI agent, putting the truth ahead of political expediency have resulted in a dead-end job in the Phoenix office. At least that's where we start out in this book which happens to be book four in Kyle Mills' "Beamonverse."

A new terrorist threat brings Beamon back from the desk job. A videotape proves that Al Qaeda is in the United States and has access to modern missile technology. The FBI suspects there is a connection between the Mob and the fanatics, and sends Beamon undercover with a fellow agent. When the other agent is brutally murdered, Beamon's attempts to trace the man who fingered them lead him into an international criminal conspiracy that may have roots in the CIA. As events plunge him into a river of deceit, he is forced to address the most important question of his life. What makes a crime a crime?

Beamon joins forces with with a master world criminal with unlimited power, Christian Volkov, and seems like a rogue/renegade FBI agent. After all, the mysterious force behind the Al Qaeda has made sure that Beamon is wanted in the US for the murder of Afghanis that were smuggling drugs to sell to the Mob. At times it seems as though Beamon himself doesn't know whose side he's on. But don't get discouraged, the hero is still a hero and Beamon comes out alright.

I think one of the fascinating things about this book was that it was originally completed 5 days before 9/11 and Kyle's editor sent the book back because by the time he had got to the manuscript 9/11 had happened. So Kyle had to go and do some rewrites and cut out some sections which closely resembled the attacks. In his "Beamonverse," Osama Bin Laden has been killed, but his second in command has taken over.

This book carries with it some great suspense, action, intrigue, espionage, basically everything you could want in a thriller. On his website, Kyle Mills says this may be his best book. Now, so far, I've only read this one and "Darkness Falls," and I'll have to agree that it could be either one of the books I've read. While "Darkness Falls" had you thinking this could happen, this book provides that and the fun of some global hopping and undercover crime fighting. I would love to see this book made into a movie and have Jeremy Irons as Christian Volkov and maybe Bruce Willis as Mark Beamon. I think that would be perfect.

Take another sip of that creamy cappuchino and enjoy this non-stop action thriller.